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Handling is so much better with front loading.
I’ll try to explain.
If cornering and you brake with your front brake, the bike stands up and wants to go straight on, not around the corner. This is what it feels like with rear panniers. The bike fights corners.
When you use your rear brake in a corner, it causes the bike to lean in/corner better. That’s what it feels like front loaded. The bike corners like it’s on rails.
Also easier to climb steep gradients because the front end doesn’t want to pop up.
It’s one of those things you have to try to believe how good it is.
TM-
Are we talking touring loads or Audax/day rides? Because with a day ride load I honestly don't notice a Carradice on the back. The couple of times I've borrowed a low-trail bike with a front load it's felt different but not noticeably better; the kind of thing you get used to and forget after a couple of minutes' riding. Though I'm possibly not a spirited or aggressive enough rider to feel the handling benefits when pushing it.
Thrustvector
Why do so many of these bikes have a massive bag on a front rack
(instead of in the back / like with a regular rack above the back wheel).
Is that just en vogue right now or do people prefer the handling?
I never liked to have much weight in front of the bars, I have never been a professional / long distance / "touring" cyclist or whatever you call that so genuinely curious as to why people seem to prefer this kind of setup.
Here in Berlin people who carry stuff usually have these bags you hang on both sides of the back wheel. Well, actually the majority of people I see just uses backpacks.